Population Zero
by Eryanissa
Summary: Kasumi is pursuing her dream of VIUS warrior since her village burned to the ground. Many come to Mikuni City to search for a career in a warrior.
1. The History

**DISCLAIMER: DRAGON EYE BELONGS TO KAIRI FUJIYAMA. I OWN KASUMI AND MY SISTER OWNS ISAMU.**

I have had Kasumi now since 2006, so it's been a while. She is the one I made for Dragon Eye. If some things seem too unreal then I strongly suggest re-reading the series. I know Tsukiko seems a little fake, but he's such a cutie, I could not bear to cut him out. (:

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><p>Mankind is nothing more than a word to describe a crucifying incompetent species. It is safe to say that sooner or later all of the ones that are lucky enough to still be alive will learn a lesson or get devoured by the flesh-eating mutants. The world was coming to an end and it was already laid into ruins.<p>

As a child, I was born with fully black eyes and black hair. My parents were incredibly superstitious and believed that I was a 'demon child'. Of course, none of that was true. Every day I studied until my brain was too full of information. I strived to do the best in school that I could in hopes that I could graduate earlier and just get out away from everybody. Unfortunately, it was much more complicated than just getting good grades and moving on to the next one. Just shut your eyes and imagine being in a school with over 500 kids and no one mentions a word to you. Ever. Everyone just whispers when you walk by or gets afraid that you will throw a 'hex' on them. I hate people. I always have and always will.

A most horrendous virus began to spread which turned animals and humans alike into blood-inducing fiends. One touch of blood and that is the only thing needed to transform you into one too. It was these fiends that destroyed my city and annihilated everyone I once knew (but not so much loved).

The only possession of mine that I carried around was my royal blue duchess scythe. It was handed to me from my grandfather, the only relative to truly care for me. My real family was spoiled rich, but they left me to rot outside in a doghouse. I got whatever money it was that I wanted as long as I did not mention a word. With that money I took various things such as archery, fencing, martial arts and free running. There was dance as well but I did not care too much for it. At least all the instructors were not as cruel to me. Then again, it was in a city right outside of our small town so perhaps they were more used to people like me. Aside from all these I did enjoy going to the library and picked up some English and French . There were a few phrases I picked up from others, but that does not make one fluent.

Instead of flipping from topic to topic, I will say where perhaps the biggest change of my life occurred. This one was agonizing. M y grandfather passed away a week earlier and I went to put some orchids on his grave. The wind was still and I could hardly hear any movement. It worked for me seeming as silence was one of my best friends as well as greatest enemies. At the time of glancing upon my grandfather's tombstone, I would much rather face the silence. It was hard enough seeing his name etched into the stone showing when he lived and when he died.

I scuffled back to my town to see that the place had burst out in flames and everything was in ruins. There was obviously a darakuru attack, but they would not have fled that easily. That is when I found out that the VIUS Mikuni warriors had come through and destroyed them. At least my most memorable relative got to sleep peacefully through the attack and not become one of those monsters. When you consider a dog-house your home, it is pretty pathetic. What is more depressing though is having no place to call your home. For that night, I sat on the ashes of what was once my house and mourned.

The next morning I awoke to a strange crow staring me in the eye. It tilted it's head to the side, and so I copied it. What startled me the most was as soon as I mocked him, he began to flap his wings and caw as if he were singing to me in tones of joy. _Weird_. What was more strange was that I could understand him. He was calling me his new owner which confused me even more. As it turns out, he had a witch as an owner who sacrificed her life for his immortality. A crow with immortality? What a stupid human being to do such a thing. The crow's name was Tsukiko, meaning 'Child of the Moon'. Apparently the crow was to latch on to the next uninfected being it found – me.

I followed Tsukiko down a long path for what appeared to be five hours. He was taking me to Mikuni city because he overheard that the VIUS entrance exams were taking place and I suppose he thought of me as the type to do it. I had nowhere to sleep, nowhere to eat, nowhere to do anything so of course I said yes. My only worry was that I was unsure just a scythe would be good enough to get me through it. Also, I read that once you are inducted into the VIUS, they treat you as if you were their own. The VIUS is a place that operates missions for the destruction of the darakuru. The VIUS warriors are, of course, the people that annihilate them by using tactics. They undergo poison resistance training using some mask, they go through superior weapon wielding classes and aside from that you get placed into different squads. Some worked as an intelligence agency, some worked as a medical unit and some were just the all-out fighting units. The only thing I could hope for now is some socialization and perhaps someone that knew some decent skateboarding parks. I was in great need for a shred on the pipes.

I lifted my eyes up to see a huge building hovering over me. There it was in front of my very eyes- the VIUS Headquarters of Mikuni City.


	2. Making it into the VIUS

I journeyed into the Headquarters and waited for assistance. The woman told me to fill out a registration card for the exam and I sighed. It asked simple things of course, such as name, weapon of choice, age, gender and the list goes on. It still took about ten minutes to fill out before I handed it back to the lady. My next move was to sit down until called in for the next entrance exam.

As soon as I entered the room, I found myself staring at a strange looking man. He was explaining to us what a 'darakuru' was. I think I made myself clear above when I explained above that they were like zombies in a sense. He then rambled on about the various squads. One was the hardest to get into and then there were those that were.. well… _not _so hard but they did not seem to do much I them. Some of the squads were all out fighting units, while some were spell units and others worked as intelligence units. All of them knew how to fight, but some of them would prefer to stray away from the battles and research instead.

What made it incredibly damn hard to focus was this cotton candy head sitting right next to me. Her hair literally looked like cotton candy because it was blue, and her rosy cheeks did not help that appearance. It was like looking at one of those smiling anime foods that had the huge smile and was blushing. This chick was a screaming replica of an anime cotton candy. Her mouth was wide open and her eyes were shut. I think she was even listening to music or something. There was no way this girl was being serious…

Next up, this Sakuraba guy, (the proctor), sent us down into an eerie tunnel and told us we had to basically fight the evil bastards down below and try not to die. If we survived and fought hard, we got put into a squad. To my dismay, I got thwarted into a group with Misses Cotton Candy and some scary looking female. Her eye lashes looked like she put on too much mascara, and her shirt was far too low. I already hated the look of this. If my team mates died, well, I could very well fail and get sent back into the homeless land.

Miss make-up shook my hand and gave quite the introduction. "Hello there, two young scouts! So you want to pursue the dream of entering the VIUS? I am hoping I can get me a slice of Squadron One. I am after all a pretty talented warrior and a survivor at that! My name is Riku Takahashi, pleasure to meet you! Why don't the two of you give me a brief introduction of yourselves?"

I raised an eyebrow and found myself thinking that something was rather off about this woman. Her character just seemed to be a little too fake to me. I just laughed and replied, "My name is Kasumi Reiaba. I am pursuing the VIUS dream because my village was burned to oblivion and I need a fresh start. Seeming as the darakuru are what caused the destruction, I do happen to think revenge isn't necessarily a bad thing, eh?" I felt proud of myself for some stupid reason and I also believe I was giving off this stupid-ass smile.

The blue princess smiled like a moron and had her stupid mouth open for no apparent reason. She then blinked and realized that she was being spoken to too at the same time. She shook her head and then threw her fist out for whatever reason and then spoke alas. "My name is Isamu Mikosai and I had somewhat of the same issue as my friend here. My village burned down and sucked and so here I am!" She took a good hard look at me and then gasped. "Why do you look so glum? Did I take you by surprise? Yeah, I have a tendency of doing that to people."

I really did sit there with a bored expression on my face. I did not think of me being _glum _though. The three of us all inched forward and stared down the dark and eerie cave entrance. All that could be heard was agonizing howls and vicious snarls. This was almost enough to make a little girl cry. Perhaps there was already mindless slaughter going on or perhaps there were some morons being devoured. If you are stupid enough to go in without thought and just wave your weapon in front of you like an idiot, then you deserve to die.

We ran down the tunnel and approached a big ugly thing. It looked like a spider, but the legs were so huge and bulky. I had no idea such an ugly thing could exist. It's eyes were huge and red, and all the same, atrocious size. As for its fangs, they looked almost like that of a snake. Before I could examine it any further, Riku took a nice big whack out of it with her weird, sharp, towel-looking object. The spider hissed and then exploded into dust. It was by far the strangest thing I had ever seen, and then I had only hoped humans did that before you saw their insides splutter. Truly disgusting.

Riku explained to us that the darakuru could even take place of cute children or of gaudy creatures like the one that stood before us. Before she could go into further detail, we heard what sounded like a wolf's howl just screeching through the tunnel almost loud enough to burst one's ear drum. We darted down as quickly as we could and without a second thought, I flailed my scythe towards the hideous dog-like creature to see it turn into dust. I guess since it turned into dust it must have been a darakuru. That is when Isamu flailed her arms around and sobbed. I guess wolves were her favorite animal and seeing that one go was not to her liking.

I felt something approach my shoulder and then disappear. Isamu saved my ass right before something dug its ugly fangs into me. I felt a little woozy to think I could have died, but I quickly regained my balance and focus. I quickly muttered thanks, and then we heard a loud, annoying whistle. That is when Riku took off her mask and then did a creepy laugh.

Over a nice cup of hot chocolate, she explained to us that her actual name was Aoi Shizue, captain of Squad 6 and she was going undercover as a student. This way she could examine us and pick off people that she wanted to join her squad. She thought that a scythe was a unique choice in weapon and so she asked me if I would join. I thought of that as an odd reason to want someone to join your team, and she did creep me out. I am odd myself, for I love the fact that she was able to make me shudder and so I accepted her kind offer. As for Isamu, she got granted a spot in Squad One which made me incredibly jealous, but I cannot really complain. I just hope that there were people there that liked the heavy music and skateboarding that I could hang out with here and there.

We all parted ways and Aoi took me down to her headquarters where the crew sat around all day awaiting orders for some slaughtering. The entrance was a nice sliding door that would only open if you had a VIUS card and slid it through a card slot. I watched as she slid it through and then we walked in. I am not going to lie, but the other members gave me chills to see. They looked so boring and serious and well, not my type of people. I cannot assume just by their appearance but who knows, they could always take me by surprise. There was this one girl in particular that gave me a cold stare, but I believe that I gave her more of an evil eye seeming as she slowly turned her head towards the ground.

There was one boy there that introduced himself to me as Iruno Hachatama. He had the biggest grin on his face and seemed to be a little too hyper for my taste. The only thing that caught my ear is when I heard him say he loves to skateboard while listening to music. He wore the proper attire and everything which confused me. He just seemed more like he should be hiding from anything dangerous opposed to doing something dangerous. He did have a bruise across his eye, and I can only assume more, but he wore a long black hoodie and a black baseball cap.

There was a boy in the back leaning against the wall. He had his hands in his hoodie pocket and it was almost impossible to see his face due to the angle. Aoi explained to me that she was the boy's guardian and that his name was Hibiki Masamune. She loved to give him a hard time and give him a noogie while calling him "Masamune". That just made me wonder what happened to his parents, but I suppose that conversation will be a long time away. He seemed quiet and angry, it was a little bit creepy to be around or to even just glance at him. Perhaps it was because he seemed faceless for the moment.

I just waved at everyone and then told Aoi I had to go meet with the head of VIUS to get assigned my room. She laughed and told me that I have to go to the housing department and the lady at the front desk would give me my key. I guess it's better than having to go bug the head of VIUS and then get banished from there. At least it seemed more at home here than it did back when my parents were still alive. Aoi attempted to give me a hug but I put out my hand and she disdainfully shook it.

I ran down the hall and took the elevator up to the proper floor. As soon as the elevator opened and I turned the corner, I happened to bump heads with Isamu. _Great_.

"Hello there, Kasumi! How funny is it that I made Squad One because of the part where I saved your life? Apparently the leader of it said that they need more people like that, but he thinks I should work on being a little more serious. This whole time I went thinking I was serious and now I find out that everyone else thinks I'm too aloof. Oh well! I got Buddy to support me! He is my cute little bunny. We have been through hell and back, and don't tell anyone this, but me and my bunny are like best friends." She wore that same stupid smile the whole time and I wish something could have come out of my mouth. Just one word or something so that it seemed I was acknowledging her, but nothing escaped. She must have felt depressed, but I was never the greatest at talking to real humans. Not to mention humans that seemed way too happy for those types usually gave me horrendous headaches.

I just nodded and then walked right past her and to the lady at the desk. I felt like such an ass hole. "Hello, my name is Kasumi Reiaba and Aoi Shizue instructed me to come here to get a dorm room set up."

The woman looked over a clipboard and then scratched something off and handed me a key. With a huge smile and her head tilted sideways she said, "Here you go, room number seven on the fifteenth floor. There is a bed, desk and a lamp. Anything else you want, you will have to carry up there yourself. Have a good day and enjoy your stay here at the Mikuni VIUS Headquarters!"

I nabbed the key and then went down the elevator. When I approached my room, guess who was staying in room sixteen? Isamu Mikosai. She was everywhere. Next thing you know, she'll be haunting my dreams. She already was with me in exams and then in the hallways and now next to my room. I ducked my head as soon as she spotted me and then heard her laugh. I quickly put the key into the knob and then shut the door behind me. I locked my door twice seeming as it had two locks and then eyed the place.

It was an average bachelor apartment size. The walls were painted crimson and there happened to be one window near the bathroom door. The curtains were the same color as the paint, and the desk was made of a beautiful cherry wood. It had two compartments in it that came out to store pencils or paper. Above the two slide out compartments were two slots that looked like they were for storing books. The ground was carpeted a creamy color, and the lamp of course matched the room. It was a nice little place. The only other thing in the room happened to be a heater which was pretty thoughtful. The bathroom just had a sink and a toilet. I guess for showers, there was a shower room so that not so much water would be going on at once. I did not want to shower in front of people, but there was not much I could do about it. Hygiene was one of the most important things to me. I put Tsukiko's new bird cage up on the desk and let him rest on it. Without much more thought, it was cold and I was tired and so I put my head down and fell asleep hoping that day two would be an okay enough day.


End file.
